308 lines
18 KiB
Plaintext
308 lines
18 KiB
Plaintext
Plastic Model Kit of
|
|
J. R."BOB" DOBBS
|
|
1:8 Scale
|
|
|
|
Long, long ago, during the Years of Trouble, when all the
|
|
Northern Fathers still slept under the glaciers, there lived the being we
|
|
now know as J. R. "Bob" Dobbs. This man, Dobbs, was chosen by JHVH-1 for
|
|
the Primary Communaonications from our alien benefactors, the Xists. As
|
|
`"Bob" moved through the stars, he changed the face of them. His ten
|
|
billion Quasi-modalities now vibrate in each of us, and have transformated
|
|
him into the ETERNAL INCARNATION OF SLACK. From Dobbs came the UnReasoned
|
|
Utterances which will remain forever unerasable. His brave experimentation
|
|
with Excremeditation and Fornicationalism, using all Humankind as his test
|
|
flock, resulted in the rule of the SubGenius for the next twelve thousand
|
|
years. During his Span, disaater followed Dobbs, resulting in the outright
|
|
obliteration of his physical vessel. Only by careful, Church- supervised
|
|
studies can we now have our first look at the Dobbshell. Here is the
|
|
approved Religiofficial Bioreconstructoid, perfect in every detail: Our
|
|
Salesrnan. His skull is shaped a bit differently than is ours today. It is
|
|
somewhat flattened in the rear and bulges over the brow. His brain was
|
|
well devolved. Some theocraticians think that Dobbs did not speak at all,
|
|
or that if he did, he did not have what we would call a language. He wears
|
|
the Suit. His hands and feet are like ours. He was left-handed. The
|
|
Briefcase he holds sent the signals that launched the Rockets of
|
|
Cleansing, the blessed vehicles of our birth. He stands here in the
|
|
wreckage of Earth, his native planet.
|
|
|
|
-Paul Mavrides
|
|
|
|
|
|
BEFOREWORD
|
|
|
|
|
|
Traditionally, there are only two reasons for any book to have an
|
|
introduction, or foreword, or preforeword or whatever the hell the editor
|
|
decides to call that thing in the front of a book.
|
|
|
|
Reason #1: To Boost Sales
|
|
|
|
Someone discovered long ago that an artfully dropped name can
|
|
establish instant credibility in certain situations. In the publishing in-
|
|
dustry, this translates into the practice of inviting some celebrity or
|
|
well-known expert to introduce a work. All too often, that is the sole
|
|
"kicker" which sells it. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that the
|
|
quality ofthe introduction will be commensurate with the selling power
|
|
ofthe introducer's name.
|
|
|
|
Reason #2: Sentimental Obligations
|
|
|
|
The editor bestows the honor of writing the introduction upon
|
|
an old buddy-some harmless but washed-up has-been to whom he owes a favor
|
|
just to give the doddering hack a break, "for old times' sake." While this
|
|
approach sometimes makes for a more enlightening and sincere introduction,
|
|
sales may suffer from the lack of status attached to the decrepit old
|
|
bum's name.
|
|
|
|
As difficult as it may be to believe, a book's ultimate
|
|
success depends entirely upon which of these traditional paths is chosen
|
|
by the editor. Since I fit neither category ofintroducers, this book may
|
|
conceivably be one of those `"wild cards" that shatter all accepted norms
|
|
of publishing . . if not even civilization as we know it, considering the
|
|
nature of our missionl
|
|
|
|
Some readers may also be surprised to learn that the foreword
|
|
is usually the last part of a book to be written, and that the foreword
|
|
actually contains the afterthoughts. A common afterthought is that readers
|
|
might wonder why in the world the book was ever written . . . which may be
|
|
particularly true in this case, so an especially lengthy attempt at an
|
|
explanation, or at least an excuse, is required.
|
|
|
|
The public generally associates my name with J. ft. "Bob" Dobbs
|
|
and the Church of the SubGenius, and well it should. I have known "Bob"
|
|
since our college days, when I saved him from drowning in a mud puddle
|
|
after he had been knocked unconscious during a panty raid. (His skull was
|
|
fractured by a bra with ice frozen into its cups-a bra hurled by none
|
|
other than his wife-to-be, the attractive and gracious "Connie" Marsh.
|
|
Yes, all three ofus met simultaneously on that fateful night in 1946.)
|
|
|
|
After several years of casual friendship and countless poker
|
|
games, my win/loss ratio with "Bob" was hopelessly lopsided and my family
|
|
fortune exhausted. I prevailed upon his boundless good nature to let me
|
|
earn back some ofmy money. Pitying me, Dobbs proffered an opportunity by
|
|
which I could both repay him my debts and recover my own losses many times
|
|
over. Promising a get-rich-quick scheme unparalleled in history, he
|
|
enlisted my aid in founding the Church of the Sub- Genius and its public
|
|
relations arm, The SubGenius Foundation, Inc. Utilizing my experience and
|
|
numerous contacts in the advertising business, I chose the then-destitute
|
|
Rev. Ivan Stang to fill the open Sacred Scribe position at Foundation
|
|
headquarters in Dallas. Ivan's task was to compile and organize the
|
|
encrypted instructions provided by Dobbs: arcane trance memos and codices
|
|
that ultimately became the early SubGenius pamphlets. "Bob" had long since
|
|
undergone his Divine Emaculation, and had consequently amassed a personal
|
|
fortune in the eleven-figure range. He then pretended to retire from
|
|
public life. (lt was even rumored in the Pentagon that he had actually
|
|
fled our solar system!)
|
|
|
|
Nevertheless, in 1979, in caves hidden in the vastness of the
|
|
Himalayas, the Most High Tibetan Lamas surgically altered my brain under
|
|
the direct tutelage of Dobbs-performing that perilous operation, the
|
|
Opening of fhe Third Nostril. This enabled me to receive, unimpeded,
|
|
dogmatic revelations directly from interstellar Silent Radio signals. It
|
|
simultaneously prepared me for that painful somatic mutation to literal,
|
|
physical OverManhood which so drastically warped my appearance that I now
|
|
must conceal my visage from the squeamish, bigoted eyes of normal humans.
|
|
Despite arduous spiritual preparations, I underwent the very tortures of
|
|
Hell when first I channeled the brain scorching direct transmissions
|
|
required for The Booh of the SubGenius (Fireside/Simon & Schuster trade
|
|
paperback, $10.95).
|
|
|
|
But who, some few may ask, is this man J. R. "Bob" Dobbs? As
|
|
difficult as it is for me to imagine that there are still so many mired in
|
|
ignorance, it yet remains a most challenging question to answer possibly
|
|
the most challenging of our time. After all, how does one describe the
|
|
indescribable, and define the indefinable? I shall attempt nonetheless to
|
|
paint a portrait of"Bob"-one equating not so much to a photograph, but at
|
|
best to a child's broken-crayon stick-figure scrawl. J. R. "Bob" Dobbs: on
|
|
the surface, an average, good-looking all-American "Joe," though of
|
|
debated parentage; perpetual smoker of a sacred briar Pipe filled with
|
|
mysterious and, some claim, hallucinatory admixtures; master omni-salesman
|
|
of legendary abilities (very probably the historical "Traveling Salesman"
|
|
of mythology), to whom has been widely attributed total command of the
|
|
Luck Plane by virtue of, not skill, but sheer and unadulterated intuitive
|
|
ignorance; recognized as Patron Saint of Salesmen the world over;
|
|
contacted and Emaculated in his youth by the alien space-god JHVH-1 to
|
|
receive instructions for initiating select individuals into the secrets of
|
|
Original Slack, its at- tainment, abuse and true purpose; founder of a
|
|
burgeoning cult religion with literally countless schisms and heretical
|
|
spin-offs; purportedly as- sassinated in 1984 by the renegade Church
|
|
Hierarchite D. Woodman Atwell (aka Puzzling Evidence and Ilberbrow), but
|
|
also allegedly resurrected in 198? at Dokstok, a pagan convocation of
|
|
fanatical upper-echelon Church executives; prophesied savior of the
|
|
dogma-following and dues-paying Chosen on X-Day, July 5, 1998, when his
|
|
"customers" the Xists arrive from "Planet X"; Honorary Pilot ofthe
|
|
pleasure-saucer Escape Vessels ofthe Sex Goddesses; and captain ofthe
|
|
Church softball team.
|
|
|
|
"Bob's" teachings promote awareness of the Original Slack with
|
|
which all bipeds, MereHumans and SubGenu alike, are endowed at birth,
|
|
allowing us to exercise and financially exploit our Abnormality
|
|
Potentials. He fights to ensure that this innate Slack is not squandered
|
|
or, worse yet, stolen outright by that Conspiracy of Normals which
|
|
presently controls this planet. Only if the Universal Slack levels are
|
|
high enough, and the smoke from `"Bob's" Pipe sufficiently thick, will the
|
|
Xists materialize and save all paid-up, Yeti-descended Ordained SubGenius
|
|
Ministers -while trashing in their interplanetary "beer run" not only the
|
|
faithless human Conspiracy dupes (or `"Pinks," "Menialitites,"
|
|
"Mediocretins," etc.), but their entire hellhole planet as well. These are
|
|
but a few reasons you owe it to yourself to purchase The Book ofthe
|
|
SubGenius-ifyou haven't already-and to buy additional copies with which to
|
|
save your loved ones . . . but NOT, necessarily, excuses for waiting to
|
|
purchase this third book. (High Weirdness by Mail, an expose of rival
|
|
false cults, is the second. )
|
|
|
|
Ordainment, membership documents and subscription to the Church
|
|
journal, The Stark Fist of Remoual, are $20 from SubGenius, Box 140306,
|
|
Dallas, Texas 75214 ($30 overseas); $1 for catalog of audio- and
|
|
videotapes, pamphlets, posters, clothing and other Churchly items. High
|
|
Weirdness by Mail, the cyclopedic directory of kookified mutation and
|
|
artistic frenzy, is, partially, our way of repaying those early
|
|
collaborators who gobbled up the bait, for it promotes hundreds of their
|
|
own secular rantzines, scientific discoveries, performance projects, UFO
|
|
con- tacts, forbidden musical recordings and shunned comic books, all
|
|
created independently of the Dobbsword-indeed, created as if in psychic
|
|
rebellion against the insidious spiritual grip within which Dobbs had, in
|
|
many cases, threatened to engulftheir minds. Dobbs was proud ofthem for
|
|
that, and rewarded them. Both High Weirdness and The Booh of the SubGenius
|
|
are $12 each postpaid from The SubGenius Foundation, Box 140306, Dallas,
|
|
Texas 75214. They may also be ordered bv better bookstores evervwhere
|
|
throueh the nublisher. Simon & Schuster.
|
|
|
|
|
|
The Book of the SubGenius presented the Teachings of Dobbs in
|
|
a formal, almost Biblical "textbook" style. It succeeded in luring into
|
|
the fold those brilliant collaborators who have made the Church
|
|
relentlessly grow and grow, like the Blob of pop mythology or the Sceptre
|
|
of Priapus in classical legendry-simultaneously inoculating our endeavors
|
|
against the entropic stagnation which afflicts all rival religions. The
|
|
intentions, then, of this anthology of fables, parables and dramatic
|
|
historical retellings is to help students transcend the hidebound, stodgy
|
|
formality of earlier revealed dogma, to grasp by example Dobbs' more
|
|
subtle characteristics, and simply to enjoy his true-life adventures as he
|
|
seeks to accomplish his Nameless Mission: a mission whose origin and
|
|
purpose remain a total mystery, certainly unfathomable through mere rote
|
|
memorization ofPreScripture. Indeed, it's possible that those who haven't
|
|
researched previous SubGenius litany may, ironically, glean more pure
|
|
Slack from this collection than will the "Bobbies" who've memorized Dobbs'
|
|
every recorded utterance. For they will be inculcating themselves with
|
|
Dobbs Knowledge from context-which, preliminary studies suggest, is the
|
|
most expeditious way to extract that " Grail ofthe Philosophers"! "Bob's"
|
|
is a living church, a dynamic social organism better understood through
|
|
even vicarious experience than through the simplistic doctrines and
|
|
embarrassing rituals which hobble lesser faiths.
|
|
|
|
What exactly is a "Three-Fisted Tale of"Bob" "? Any answer lies
|
|
only in what the Tales are not. They aren'tjust gripping yarns ofaction
|
|
and suspense, nor whimsical fantasy, nor pathetic cuteness-and-light New
|
|
Age prattlings. Nor are they limited to the strictures of science fiction
|
|
or lurid murder mystery traditions. One cannot label them simply
|
|
"romance"; and it is impossible to pigeonhole any solely as spy thrillers,
|
|
humor, or sword-and-sorcery. They are, instead, a revolutionary
|
|
amalgamation of all of the above, and far more!
|
|
|
|
Defying all basic literary genres, they lie more in the realm
|
|
of Apocrypha-dictated not by Dobbs, as was The Book of the SubGenius, but
|
|
instead by his Apostles, his Fishers of Wallets. A few Tales may even seem
|
|
heretical in content . . . but, more often, they represent in- spired
|
|
prophetic visions, biographical reenactments, and outright but no less
|
|
valid fabrications. Whether solidly researched, untarnishable histories,
|
|
or strictly metaphorical parables, they fill out the previously sketchy
|
|
picture of "Bob" Dobbs the man.
|
|
|
|
To protect his family, Dobbs himself insists that we never
|
|
identify which are true histories and which (if any) are fables; he
|
|
trustingly leaves that determination up to you, our dearly beloved Reader.
|
|
Thus, if any given Tale seems particularly distasteful to you personally,
|
|
it is your right to rank it among the subversive lies; those that you
|
|
enjoy, on the other hand, may be taken as irrefutable and factual
|
|
chronicles worthy of being etched into the Rock of Ages.
|
|
|
|
Being true SubGeniuses all, each author sees "Bob" differently,
|
|
depending upon his or her own ethical development. One writer may be
|
|
accurately recounting the Master's deeds, while the next is a schismatic
|
|
reprobate intent upon destruction of the Church from within. "Bob" still
|
|
insists that you be the judge.
|
|
|
|
Our contributors hail from all walks of life: occultists,
|
|
astrologers, rich jet-setters, doctors, minimum-wage slaves, yardmen,
|
|
poverty stricken geek visionaries, upper-level corporate managers,
|
|
Berkeley egghead intelligentsia, right-wing fascists, frothing Commie
|
|
radicals, filmmakers, technical writers, Christian missionaries,
|
|
suicidal wretches both successful and failed, cartoonists, avant-garde
|
|
painters, rock musicians . . . even gorgeous, slinky housewives in sheer,
|
|
silken evening gowns. (One manages to combine all of the above callings!)
|
|
Some have had absolutely no prior professional writing experience, yet
|
|
were obviously inspired by what can only be termed " Higher Powers." Two
|
|
or three have actually built successful careers as accomplished, paid
|
|
storytellers!
|
|
|
|
As for the editor ofthis anthology, the Rev. Ivan Stang is a
|
|
celebrated and erudite man ofdistinction known the world over-an
|
|
accomplished author, radio personality, film auteur . . . and regular
|
|
family man. Known for his ranting "Southern preacher"-style sermon
|
|
delivery, Rev. Stang has organized soul-saving Church Devivals across this
|
|
country (and several foreign nations) to great critical and even
|
|
supernatural acclaim.
|
|
|
|
He has arranged these Tales not chronologically, but rather by
|
|
strin- gent (but seductively simple) Drummondian subliminal Silent Radio
|
|
mind-control techniques. The first few stories provide a perspective for
|
|
new readers unfamiliar with the orthodox dogma: introductory Tales, if you
|
|
will. At the same time, they serve to remind self proclaimed "Sub-Genius
|
|
experts" of those sound basic doctrines whence sprang the Church's
|
|
pythonic, back-to-the-Pamphlet, dogma-scrubbing redeformation movement.
|
|
|
|
Once the explanatory narratives have been digested, the newly
|
|
illuminated reader may hurtle uncontrollably but safely into the more
|
|
profound, esoteric and, mayhaps, frightening tales-those designed to
|
|
disconnect established thought patterns and sabotage habitual mental
|
|
logic. Gliding effortlessly into a euphoric haze of real or imaginary
|
|
happenings, the reader will imbibe freely of the fermented fruits of those
|
|
who are not-quite-geniuses, becoming "drunk as a lord" with enlightenment.
|
|
|
|
Finally, when the maximum limit of enlightenment absorption is
|
|
reached, the reader (if he or she can still be referred to as such) may
|
|
stealthily dare to approach the last stories-hideous necropoli of
|
|
soullessly rotting, maleficent, stench-filled pre-/post-histories wherein
|
|
mysterious apparitions gleefully carve their unspeakable names upon the
|
|
foolish mortal reader's heart and soul. Tales of this depth simply defy
|
|
all earthly description. This arrangement allows the reader to become
|
|
gradually familiar not only with the ancillary characters who populate the
|
|
later stories, but even r,vith their writing styles-for did not these
|
|
so-called "characters" u>rite half the stories??
|
|
|
|
This is the first One True Anthology to represent the entire
|
|
gamut of the Before-, After-, and In-Between Resurrection annals-the first
|
|
(of, hopefully, many volumes) to dare cover ALL conceptual bases, charging
|
|
cheerfully and unfalteringly into the colossal sales fray that is the
|
|
marketplace, battling head to head with any and all competitive comers,
|
|
even the shallowest of best-sellers. And it shall surely come up smiling,
|
|
delivering Dobbs' Ultimate Punch Line in its pristine virgin
|
|
state-unsullied and uninterpreted.
|
|
|
|
By promising nothing, "Bob" both gives us the world and grants
|
|
us the final laugh . . . that laugh which will surely last all the way to
|
|
the bank, no matter how this book's sales figures may be impugned by any
|
|
pencil-necked geek of a market-myopic chain-bookstore accountant. We
|
|
sincerely hope that these Tales somehow allow the elusive awareness of
|
|
Slack to delicately insinuate itself into our readers' consciousnesses,
|
|
preferably without damaging their abilities to do their dayjobs.
|
|
|
|
|
|
After all, we value their money almost as highly as their souls.
|
|
It is therefore my most profound privilege to declare to you, dear
|
|
Reader: READ ON IF YOU DARE!
|
|
This is mv testament!
|
|
|
|
-Dr. Philo Drummond
|
|
OverMan lst Degree,
|
|
First Authorized FisTem-
|
|
ple Lodge, Church of the
|
|
SubGenius / Drummondian
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|